Upstream Battle®
What is
Upstream Battle®?
It’s estimated that up to 12.7 million tonnes of plastic gets into the sea each and every year – that's a truck full of litter a minute. It's killing wildlife, threatening ecosystems and habitats, and is extremely difficult and expensive to clean up.
Many initiatives that tackle marine litter are targeted at cleaning up our beaches or trying to remove litter from the sea once it's there. But, as 80% of all marine litter comes from land, we also need to face this problem upstream, where litter is washed into gutters, blown into streams or carelessly discarded. Worryingly, we are seeing a steady increase in the amount of land-based litter, which means there's a greater chance it'll end up in the sea.
We must stop this cycle of litter and prevent it from entering the sea in the first place.
Upstream Battle® focuses on changing littering behaviour to prevent marine litter at source along rivers across Scotland. We are working along rivers and their tributaries to raise awareness, gather evidence and inspire action.
How do we do this?
Are you an individual who wants to do something about litter and the state of the marine environment? Are you part of a community group located near a waterway? Or are you a watersports enthusiast who wants to see a cleaner river? Then we need your help.
How? Whilst we know that 80% of marine litter is estimated to come from land, we want to know in detail how, where or what is getting into our rivers. By working with individuals, communities, local authorities and businesses along rivers, we want to create Scotland's first comprehensive river litter data set.
We would love for you to be part of the Upstream Battle®.
Since Upstream Battle ® launched in 2018, local groups and individuals have been at the heart of the efforts to take action to keep Scotland’s rivers clean. In supporting community groups to develop and expand, we have inspired hundreds of people to survey and litter pick along their local waterway, preventing litter from ending up in our seas! We want to inspire individuals to get involved with the campaign and clean up their local waterway too! Anyone and everyone can be involved in Upstream Battle.
Many of the community groups tackling litter in their local area are part of our network of Community Clean Up Hubs which can be located on our Clean Up Hub Map.
We also love to work with businesses who want to take some practical action in their communities and to promote what we can do to tackle marine litter.
We want to help young people to understand that littering on land can have impacts all the way downstream to the sea, where it becomes marine litter.
There are many ways young people can get involved in Upstream Battle, whether it is through Climate Action Schools activities, completing litter picks and litter surveys as part of Duke of Edinburgh Award volunteering or through uniformed group activities such as Scouting and Guiding.
We even have activity sheets and scavenger hunts for very young people to get involved too.
We want to make sure that everyone understands the extent of the marine litter problem and that everyone living near a waterway is motivated to keep their waterway clean.
You can help raise awareness of the journey of marine litter from source to sea through sharing messages on social media, displaying posters and promoting local Upstream Battle activities.
